# Series bible > The living reference for a show — characters, world rules, tone, arcs, and continuity the room consults while writing episodes. Also known as show bible, bible ## In practice A series bible drifts when it lives five tools away from the episodes. Keep characters, world rules, tone, and continuity in Plot next to the scripts and treatments the room actually opens every morning. Distance is how contradictory canon survives unnoticed until production asks a question you cannot answer. Update the bible when the show invents new rules, not only when someone has time for wiki gardening. Assign an owner in the room. Treatments tell one story's plot; the bible is the ongoing rulebook across episodes — different jobs, both required for serialized work that has to stay consistent under pressure. Canvas is fine for research binders and general team wikis, and Plot embeds can cite scenes from those docs, but Canvas is not the home for the series bible. If a binder helps, link it — do not relocate the room's canon out of Plot "for convenience" and hope everyone still looks there. [TV series bible template](https://www.inkwell.software/templates/tv-series-bible) ## Common questions ### Should a series bible live in Plot or Canvas? Plot. Keep the bible beside episodes. Canvas is for novels, research binders, and team wikis — useful nearby, not a substitute home for room canon. ### How is a series bible different from a treatment? A treatment tells one story's plot. A series bible is the ongoing rulebook and character/world reference across episodes, updated as the show invents canon. ### Who should edit the bible? Give it a clear owner in the room, then let others propose updates. Unowned bibles become polite fiction nobody trusts during breaking. ### Can I embed bible sections into Canvas docs? Use Canvas for research that cites Plot — but keep the bible's source of truth in Plot next to episodes, not relocated into a binder. ## Related terms - [Writers' room](https://www.inkwell.software/glossary/writers-room): The team that breaks story, drafts episodes, and revises together. Rooms need shared drafts, clear history, and a way to try parallel takes without losing accountability. - [Retcon](https://www.inkwell.software/glossary/retcon): A later story changing what an earlier one established: a death that turns out not to have happened, a backstory that is rewritten, a rule that now works differently. Short for "retroactive continuity". Planned, it is a reveal; unplanned, it is a continuity error. - [Worldbuilding](https://www.inkwell.software/glossary/worldbuilding): Designing the world a story happens in: its rules, history, powers, institutions and what each of them costs. In a script, the world shows through what characters can do, what stops them and what it costs them, not through explanation. - [Save point](https://www.inkwell.software/glossary/save-point): A named, unchanging snapshot of your draft at a moment you choose — “Table read,” “Before studio notes.” Unlike autosave, it never quietly overwrites itself, so you can always return to exactly that version. --- Canonical page: